Sabtu, 19 Juni 2021
Iran votes for new President with reformists barred from standing - BBC News - BBC News
https://news.google.com/__i/rss/rd/articles/CBMiK2h0dHBzOi8vd3d3LnlvdXR1YmUuY29tL3dhdGNoP3Y9VkkyYnl0Q0JONTDSAQA?oc=5
2021-06-18 21:33:11Z
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Jumat, 18 Juni 2021
Lisbon gave protesters' data to foreign embassies - BBC News
Authorities in the Portuguese capital Lisbon illegally handed over protesters' personal details to the foreign embassies they were picketing, an audit has found.
Data was shared 52 times from 2018-19, said Lisbon mayor Fernando Medina.
He declined to say which embassies were involved, but media reports cited China, Israel and Russia.
Last week, a protest organiser said her personal details had been shared with the Russian embassy in Portugal.
The woman - who has dual Russian-Portuguese citizenship - said she did not know whether she would now be allowed back in Russia.
Russia, China and Israel have so far made no public comments on the issue.
Mr Medina on Friday acknowledged that the audit of city council procedures concluded that protest organisers' data had been illegally shared.
There were 182 such cases since 2012, but the mayor highlighted 52 instances which happened after the EU's General Data Protection Regulation - which bans such data sharing - came into force in 2018.
The mayor apologised, and said the official responsible for data protection would be dismissed.
"This was an inadequate policy which should never have happened," Mr Medina said.
Mr Medina is now himself under pressure to resign, the BBC's Alison Roberts in Lisbon reports.
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2021-06-18 21:06:17Z
CBMiMGh0dHBzOi8vd3d3LmJiYy5jby51ay9uZXdzL3dvcmxkLWV1cm9wZS01NzUzMDI2MNIBNGh0dHBzOi8vd3d3LmJiYy5jby51ay9uZXdzL3dvcmxkLWV1cm9wZS01NzUzMDI2MC5hbXA
Abortion rights: US Catholic bishops face clash with Biden - BBC News
US Catholic bishops are on a potential collision course with President Joe Biden after voting to commission a document that may call for him to be barred from Holy Communion.
The US Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) clashed online over whether to draw up a teaching document on politicians who support abortion.
Holy Communion is the most important ritual in the Catholic Christian faith.
The Catholic president regularly attends Church services.
Responding to news of the bishops' vote, he said: "That's a private matter and I don't think that's gonna happen."
The Vatican has already indicated its opposition to the bishops' move.
After the debate on Thursday, the Most Reverend Allen H Vigneron, vice-president of the USCCB, announced the move had passed by 168 to 55, with six abstentions.
The US clergy is deeply divided on the issue. The Most Rev Robert McElroy, bishop of San Diego, warned such a document would lead to the "weaponisation" of the Eucharist (the more formal name name for Holy Communion).
However, the Most Rev Liam Cary, the bishop of Baker, Oregon, said the Church was in an "unprecedented situation" with "a Catholic president who is opposed to the teaching" of the Church.
Vatican appeal
The document will now be drafted by the doctrine committee of US bishops.
However, although it will be a form of national policy, it will not be binding. Each individual bishop has the right to decide who should be blocked from the Mass in his diocese.
The document will return for debate at the next bi-annual US Catholic Bishops Conference in November.
The controversial issue of whether politicians who support abortion should receive Mass has become more prominent with the election of Mr Biden as president.
Cardinal Blase Cupich, archbishop of Chicago, warned most priests would be "puzzled to hear that bishops now want to talk about excluding people at a time when the real challenge before them is welcoming people back to the regular practice of the faith and rebuilding their communities".
However, proposing the motion, Bishop Kevin Roades, of Fort Wayne-South Bend, said: "We weren't targeting particular individuals or limited to one issue, but I think we need to accept the [Church's] discipline that those who obstinately persist in grave sin are not to be admitted to Holy Communion."
Cardinal Luis Ladaria - the prefect for the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the Vatican's theological watchdog - urged the US Catholic Bishops Conference to delay the debate.
He wrote to the conference saying it would be "misleading" to suggest abortion and euthanasia were "the only grave matters of Catholic moral and social teaching that demand the fullest level of accountability on the part of Catholics".
Joe Biden is the second Catholic elected US president, after John F Kennedy. He could be the first president to be denied Communion by his Church - a remarkable development that emphasises the divisive nature of abortion in US politics and religious life.
Biden isn't the only politician to support abortion rights who has faced sanction by Catholic clergy, of course. Former Secretary of State John Kerry drew similar warnings when he ran for president in 2004, and several members of the Kennedy family have been prohibited.
In addition, the resolution being considered by the US Catholic bishops would be non-binding, and Biden's church in Washington, the Jesuit-run Holy Trinity, seems unlikely to heed the guidance.
Nevertheless, at a time when the Catholic Church has been beset by a decades-long paedophilia scandal and membership has declined, the decision to consider punishing perhaps the best-known American Catholic - a man who attends Mass weekly and regularly speaks of his faith - comes with considerable risk.
For many members of the US Catholic leadership, however, abortion is an issue of life and death - and one worth the fight. As the Supreme Court is poised to consider the national legality of the procedure, it's a subject that seems destined only to become contentious.
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2021-06-18 19:36:26Z
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Joe Biden health: Ex-White House doc urges POTUS to take conginitive test - Daily Express
Texas Republican representative Ronny Jackson has claimed US President Joe Biden does not appear to be "physically or cognitively fit". He has urged the president to be tested as his job is "demanding". It comes following multiple incidents where Mr Biden has sparked health fears with the public.
Speaking to Fox News host Sean Hannity, Mr Jackson said: "He's not physically or cognitively fit to be our president right now.
"I know what the rigors of this job are, physically and cognitively - it's demanding.
"He's not inspiring confidence.
"It's sending the wrong message to our adversaries."
READ MORE: France election: Latest polls predict fall of Macron in regional vote
He added: "We need to know that we can trust our president, and we need to know that he's in charge of what's going on and someone else isn't pulling the strings behind the scenes.
"Because that's what it looks like now."
In March, Mr Biden was filmed falling over while walking up the stairs of Air Force One ahead of flying to Georgia.
The 78-year-old quickly recovered from the fall and continued up the stairs.
"His gait is precisely the gait the elderly get before their first big fall."
A third said: "This man has no business in the position he was installed in. He's not physically or mentally fit to be there!
"He'll be down for days because of this fall."
It comes a year after Mr Biden released a medical assessment which describes him as "healthy and vigorous".Dr. Kevin O’Connor of The George Washington University released a three-page medical summary of president's health.
Mr Biden, who survived two brain aneurysms in the late 1980s, has not had any serious medical issues since.
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2021-06-18 19:52:00Z
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Hongkongers flock to support raided newspaper Apple Daily - The Times
Thousands of democracy supporters in Hong Kong flocked to buy copies of the newspaper Apple Daily today, which ran the headline “we must press on” after hundreds of police officers raided its offices and arrested five executives.
The increased its print run from about 80,000 copies to 500,000 after officers dragged its editor-in-chief Ryan Law and four of his colleagues out of its newsroom yesterday.
Law and Cheung Kim-hung, the chief executive of Apple Daily’s parent company Next Digital, were charged with collusion with a foreign country today in a national security case that has sent chills through the city’s media.
Thousands of people went to buy copies of Apple Daily today to protest against a raid on its offices
JEROME FAVRE/EPA
The other three members of staff arrested, Royston Chow Tat-kuen, the chief operating officer of Next Digital, Chan Pui-man, associate publisher, and Cheung
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2021-06-18 12:55:00Z
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Israeli forces attack Al-Aqsa protesters during Prophet rally - Al Jazeera English
At least 47 Palestinians also hurt by tear gas, rubber bullets near the town of Beita in the occupied West Bank, says Palestine Red Crescent.
At least three Palestinians were hurt after Israeli forces stormed the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in occupied East Jerusalem on Friday.
Following Friday prayers, Palestinian worshippers started a rally in support of the Prophet Muhammad in response to insults directed at him during a hardline Israeli march through the area on Tuesday.
Palestinians gathered in the courtyard, but before they began their march from Al-Aqsa to the Old City’s Damascus Gate, Israeli forces raided the compound through Bab al-Silsila, one of its entrances.
They fired rubber-coated steel bullets, tear gas, and stun grenades, emptying the compound of thousands of worshippers.
Hundreds demonstrated after Friday prayers in response to a rally held by Jewish ultranationalists on Tuesday, in which dozens chanted “Death to Arabs” and “May your village burn”.
The Palestinians protested against insulting Prophet Muhammad after an online video showed some of the participants in the Tuesday march denigrating him.
The Middle East Eye reported Israeli forces shot one of its journalists, Latifeh Abdelatif, in the knee with a rubber-coated round as they raided the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound.
The London-based news website said one of its contributors, Sondus Ewies, was also wounded, but the extent of her injuries remained unclear.
Fragile truce
The incidents come hours after Israeli fighter jets launched a series of air raids on the Gaza Strip for the second time since a shaky ceasefire ended last month’s 11-day war.
Palestinian sources on the ground said Israeli missiles on Thursday night hit several sites belonging to armed groups northwest of Gaza City and north of Beit Lahia in the besieged territory.
The raid comes as a fragile ceasefire that came into effect less than a month ago holds in the besieged Gaza Strip, ending the Israeli bombing campaign that killed at least 256 people, including 66 children.
Another Israeli police crackdown on worshippers at the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound during Ramadan and the threat of forced expulsions of Palestinians from their homes in occupied East Jerusalem ignited protests across the occupied Palestinian territories. Israeli forces violently put those down as well.
Hamas, the group that controls the Gaza Strip, issued a deadline to Israel to halt the crackdowns. It passed unheeded, resulting in Hamas firing rockets towards Israel, and Israel launching an intensive bombing campaign on Gaza.
Hours after a truce took effect, Israeli police stormed the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound after Friday prayers.
Over the past few weeks, hardline Israeli settler groups have entered the premises on a near-daily basis, under heavy protection from Israeli troops. The groups’ objective is to rebuild the Third Jewish Temple on the grounds of Al-Aqsa Mosque, according to their websites.
But under the status quo affirmed in 1967, only Muslims can pray within al-Haram al-Sharif.
Palestinians fear Israel plans to eventually take the compound over or partition it. The Israeli government has repeatedly said it has no intention of changing the status quo, under which the Waqf oversees the site.
Dozens wounded in Beita
Meanwhile, at least 47 Palestinians were injured by Israeli forces near the town of Beita, south of Nabulus in the occupied West Bank, according to the Palestine Red Crescent.
Israeli forces fired tear gas and rubber-coated bullets at a demonstration against the recent establishment of an illegal Israeli outpost near Beita.
Beita has turned into a bloody battleground for several weeks as Israeli forces target Palestinian protesters demonstrating on a near-daily basis against the continuing takeover of their land on Mount Sabih by Israeli settlers.
Israeli settlers are currently building an illegal settlement and threatening the livelihoods of at least 17 Palestinian families – more than 100 people – who depend on harvesting their olives on land they have owned for generations.
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2021-06-18 12:50:01Z
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Iranians vote in presidential election marred by disqualification row - BBC News
Iranians are voting to elect a new president, with all but one of the four candidates regarded as hardliners.
Opinion polls suggest Ebrahim Raisi, a conservative Shia cleric who heads the judiciary, is the clear favourite.
Mr Raisi is an ally of Iran's supreme leader and has been touted as a future possible successor.
Dissidents and some reformists have called for a boycott, saying the barring of several contenders left Mr Raisi with no serious competition.
Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei cast his vote early on Friday morning in Tehran and encouraged people to go the polls.
"Each vote counts ... come and vote and choose your president," he said. "This is important for the future of your country,"
There is widespread discontent among Iranians at the economic hardship they have faced since the US abandoned a nuclear deal with Iran three years ago and reinstated crippling sanctions.
The elections coincide with the latest round of talks in Vienna between Iran and world powers that are aimed at reviving the accord, which saw Iran agree to limit its nuclear programme in return for sanctions relief.
Incumbent Hassan Rouhani, a moderate who sought to engage with the West, cannot stand for re-election because he has served two consecutive four-year terms.
Who approved the candidates?
Almost 600 hopefuls, including 40 women, registered for the election.
But in the end only seven men were approved last month by the 12 jurists and theologians on the hard-line Guardian Council, an unelected body that has the ultimate decision with regard to candidates' qualifications.
Eshaq Jahangiri, Mr Rouhani's first vice-president, and Ali Larijani, a conservative former speaker of parliament, were among the prominent candidates not allowed to run.
By Thursday, three of the approved candidates - Supreme National Security Council secretary Saeed Jalili, MP Alireza Zakani, and reformist former Vice-President Mohsen Mehralizadeh - had dropped out.
Mr Jalili and Mr Zakani, who are hardliners, both endorsed Mr Raisi, while Mr Mehralizadeh said he wanted to "unify" the reformist vote - an apparent endorsement for Mr Hammati.
If no candidate wins more than 50% of the vote in the first round there will be a run-off election.
Who's in the race?
Ebrahim Raisi
The 60-year-old cleric has served as a prosecutor for most of his career. He was appointed judiciary chief in 2019, two years after he lost by a landslide to Mr Rouhani in the last election.
Mr Raisi has presented himself as the best person to fight corruption and solve Iran's economic problems.
However, many Iranians and human rights activists have expressed concern over his role in the mass executions of political prisoners in the 1980s.
Abdolnasser Hemmati
The 64-year-old technocrat became governor of the Central Bank of Iran in 2018. He was dismissed from the position after becoming a candidate.
His appointments to prominent positions under Mr Rouhani and his hard-line processor, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, are seen as evidence of his ability to work all factions in Iran.
But he faced criticism from the other candidates for failing to mitigate the effects of US sanctions on Iran's currency, whose value has plummeted.
Mohsen Rezai
The 66-year-old hardliner is the secretary of the Expediency Council, which advises the Supreme Leader and has ultimate adjudicating power in disputes over legislation.
He was commander of the powerful Islamic Revolution Guard Corps (IRGC) during the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war, and has run for the presidency three times since leaving the force.
Amirhossein Qazizadeh Hashemi
Amirhossein Qazizadeh Hashemi is an ear, nose and throat (ENT) surgeon who has been an MP since 2008 and first deputy speaker since this May.
The 50-year-old hardliner is the youngest of the candidates.
Firm grip on power
Analysis by Kasra Naji, BBC Persian
These elections are seen by many Iranians as a brazen power grab by the hardliners who seem to have decided that they can never win free and fair elections, judging by their past performance. With these elections, the hardliners will have all the centres of power in their control. But there will be a downside: greater dissatisfaction among a people already in desperate economic straits, and instability.
If Ebrahim Raisi becomes president, the hardliners will want to establish a puritanical system of Islamic government in the vision of the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. This will bring in more controls on social activities, fewer freedoms and jobs for women, and tighter control of the social media and the press.
Under a hardline presidency, Iran would continue to have tense relations with the West. It would continue to push to extend Shia Islam and project power in the region with the help of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) - a major armed, political and economic force in Iran - and its local proxies. Iran would want to cosy up to China in the hope of attracting hundreds of billions of dollars of Chinese investment.
The election of a hardline president might also adversely affect the current indirect talks between Iran and the US to return to compliance with the 2015 nuclear agreement and have the key US sanctions lifted. The hardliners were never happy with the deal in the first place.
Why is turnout important?
About 59 million people are eligible to vote in Iran, which has a population of 80 million.
Turnout for the last presidential poll in 2017 was 73%, but the most recent survey by the state-backed Iranian Students Polling Agency (ISPA) suggested that it could be only 42% on Friday.
That would be a historic low for any election in Iran since the 1979 Islamic Revolution and would pose a problem for Iran's leaders, who see turnout as a sign of legitimacy.
On Thursday, Mr Rouhani told Iranians not to let the "shortcomings of an institution or a group" stop them from voting - an apparent reference to the Guardian Council.
"For the time being, let's not think about grievances tomorrow," he said.
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2021-06-18 09:14:23Z
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